1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a video data recording apparatus by which recorded video data can be edited with a good efficiency.
2. Description of the Related Art
The video data taken by a television camera or other camera apparatus is frequently edited and then assembled into a program, movie, etc. For example, a television broadcasting station extracts the required cuts (video data to be edited obtained by suitably recording a certain matter) from among the video data obtained through coverage and prepares the video data comprised of the desired cuts connected with each other. In order to carry out such editing with a good efficiency, it is important to suitably determine the cuts from among the filmed video data and be able to retrieve the cuts at a high speed.
As methods enabling the retrieval and editing of video data to be carried out at a high speed, there are the methods described in Japanese Patent Application Nos. 5-329841 and 5-329842 by the assignee of the present application. In these methods, when recording video data and audio data on a recording medium, compressed index information concerning the data is generated and the index information is continuously recorded on another recording medium or in a recording region of the original data of the same recording medium. By referring to that index information to prepare the edited data, it is possible to eliminate the processing on the original data and thereby to carry out the work with a good efficiency.
However, in the TV cameras and video camcorders (VTR apparatuses with built-in cameras) which have been used heretofore, when trying to shoot something which could not have been expected, it is necessary to continuously run the camera etc. and extract the cuts in which the matter is suitably recorded from among the recorded video data. Thus there arises a disadvantage of a reduction of the efficiency of the editing work.
Further, it has become possible to record a long period of video data by a recording medium such as a video tape, so the number of the cuts which can be recorded on one recording medium has naturally been increased and therefore a demand has arisen for enabling desired cuts to be retrieved with a higher efficiency.
Particularly, in a video cassette comprising a video tape accommodated in a cassette incorporating a semiconductor memory element such as a flash memory, there is a demand for enabling the editing of the recorded video data to be carried out with a good efficiency by effectively using the semiconductor memory.